


Accretion

by astronavigatrix



Category: League of Legends
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canon-Typical Violence, Drabble Collection, F/M, Sundial (relationship), we just don't know, what the fuck is league lore anymore?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-02
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-19 14:40:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7365643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astronavigatrix/pseuds/astronavigatrix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Taliyah/Ekko drabbles, both canon and AU, some connected, some not.<br/>Occasionally with prompts from various tumblrs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Convergence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ekko learns through trial and error only he remembers. Taliyah lets others know that her mistakes only make her stronger.
> 
>  
> 
> Ekko isn't entirely sure what he makes of that, but he kind of wants to figure it out.

  
    
  
      The challenge posed by the new Champion, he hears, is that you can't go where she doesn't want you to go. Not without repercussion, in any case. Ekko hears this and thinks, as he is prone to doing, that he can find a way around it-- no matter how many tries it takes. He sees her from across the lane, a slight form, possibly even slighter than his, equally lean and lanky, roughly his age, marveling over the tower before her. He hears a faint mumble about the stonework and leans against his sword, watching with a smirk that grows ever-wider until she catches sight of him from the corner of her eye. Her response is almost comical-- a quick glance that turns into a sputtering double-take, and she murmurs something he can't quite make out (something about the earth moving?) before straightening out and up in an attempt to appear more imposing. The wind catches her sleeves, which wrap themselves around her, and she shakes them back out while more color rises to cling to the freckle-mired red on her tan cheeks. Endeared (amused, he corrects internally), he gives a mockingly slow clap as the clatter of minions approaching reaches his ears, at which point he flips his sword into his hands and spreads his arms in invitation.   
  
"Show me something new!" He challenges, and she rises on a spire of earth above him in response, arms crossed and abashed smile crooked; Ekko swallows, and grins back, suitably impressed and motions her forward with the clock hand.  
  
      Challenging her further, it turns out, was a mistake.   
  
      Ekko's jumps and dashes are hindered by minefields of rocks, placed in just such a way that they force him down narrow pathways or else risk setting them off prematurely and (he learns quickly) with far more force. Those narrow paths are a hazard all their own, either with her at one end, slowing his advance with easy, graceful spins that flick rocks-- boulders, really-- at him while she defies gravity to haul them out of the ground and use the momentum of her turns to lob them at him with frightening precision. The other possible outcome is almost as bad, he learns, when a wall of rock rises suddenly and slams into him with what must be the force of one of Piltover's infamous trains, sending him careening end over end into the minefield. He rewinds from that in the nick of time as she advances with another volley of boulders and groans behind his teeth as she pauses, suddenly, and then takes off toward another lane, a wall of bedrock writhing to life beneath her feet, shifting with a noise like earthbound thunder as it rockets her away toward another lane.   
  
      He considers chasing, then takes stock of the state he's in and recalls instead.   
  
Her shadow above him becomes his way of measuring the passing of time. She is always rising, riding, rock working beneath her feet at her command almost as easily as he splits time. But he sees the cracks in the firmament, the stumbles as she grows tired, the crumbling of her walls as the match persists, and when he exploits it, dashing toward her on the heels of the detonation of one of her minefields, he knows she's seen it too. It's a stumble back that saves her, the push of earth jutting up between them halting the last leg of his advance and with wary eyes (sharp eyes, sharp as the stones she's been slinging all day, calculating, precise, _quick_ ), she  **runs**.   
  
       Though he knocks down her tower, he doesn't feel any satisfaction.   
  
      She rides into the nexus, cutting off two thirds of his team and dropping from her wall, boulders flying. He sees her minefield, prepares to dodge, and she spins to meet him, making him grin. He prepares to duck under the barrage, but instead of turning to collect another volley, she gestures viciously behind him, a body flying into his and knocking them both into her minefield. As he falls, he sees her resume that turn, prepare her ammo, and she catches his eyes as she spins, weary smile broadening for an instant.   
  
"Every lesson is a gift," she intones softly, and his eyes widen in realization.  
  
      Often, he makes mistakes and simply rewinds, changes things, fixes them so they'd never happened. She makes mistakes, and like it's the easiest thing in the world, picks herself back up so that she can learn from them. It strikes him as too mature for someone her age, but then she strikes him as too mature in general, when it comes to this. Freely using her power brings her joy, that much he'd learned watching her ride the rocks across the battlefield. Using her powers to fight brings a shadow over her eyes that's haunted, dark in a way he's seldom seen outside of dark Zaun alleys or the occasional slip of one of those among them who has seen war.   
  
      At the end of the match, he watches her stand as far from the Noxian on her team as possible, rocks hanging from her sleeves nearly vibrating from her discomfort, and  **knows**.   
  
"So hey," he distracts, and her head turns sharply toward his, surprise widening her eyes, making the soft caramel hue of them flash as they briefly accept more light, and he stumbles, stutters, and brings a hand to the back of his neck. "So you... really rocked it today," he jokes, and it takes her a moment, but then she breathes in, startled and  **grateful** and then laughs as if she can't quite control herself. Laughs sudden and sweet and presses a hand to her chest only to let out a yelp and teeter forward ino his shoulder, her laughter having pushed the ground beneath her feet up in uneven juts, and his hand automatically rises, pressing into her shoulder to steady her.   
  
"If that's what happens when you laugh, I'd hate to see what happens when you get mad."   
  
      She flashes him a look, indecipherable, but her mouth curves into a smile he's not quite sure she means and says with odd sincerity:   
  
"Let us hope you never find out."   
  
      And he knows she didn't mean it as a challenge, but he thinks one day he might be feeling irresponsible enough to make it one.  
  
      For now, however, he's content to flash her another smile, this one more assured, rough fingers squeezing the shoulder he only now realizes he's still holding. As if she's just noticing the same, she jerks herself properly upright, lip trembling as if she's casting for something to say, but he lifts a hand and waves before she can.  
  
"If you're ever in Zaun, let me know. I might say it's a little too rough for a girl like you but hey, you've been proving me wrong all day."  
  
      Color blooms over her cheeks once more, and he barely makes out her soft 'i-it was nice fighting you-- I mean, meeting you!' as he turns on his heel and saunters away.


	2. Epoch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _I'm the king and you're the queen_   
>  _and we will stumble through heaven_
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> Prompt: Young Gods

 

      Taliyah stamps her foot and the ground rises, swelling virulently with her displeasure-- hands immediately reach, placate, but she is more frightened than fearsome now and keeps off the ground when she can for the next week. She becomes a very adept climber.

      Ekko stammers out "I didn't mean to!" and finds himself waking back up in bed, hearing the same argument from his neighbors as he wakes up for school; it's like Groundhog Day, déjà vécu galore and it isn't until the third or fourh time that he realizes he can change it. He smiles, whispers "Jackpot!" and squeezes his eyes shut to try again.

      Taliyah is all about control, precision. Even her emotions are reined in, kept under lock and key to the best of her ability; around her, people whisper, wonder, "but why," they ask each other as if she's not right there, as if she can't hear, "is she always so calm? It's creepy." The stone beneath her heels cracks and slides to help her escape as she turns on her heel and runs.

      Ekko is all about control, precision. Everything he does, everything that happens, has been practiced, rehearsed, reconsidered, time and time again. Sometimes he forgets, however, loses any kind of caution, people worrying after him and getting themselves into trouble he couldn't have predicted, and even though it's hard to be surprised when you've seen it all before, Ekko hates having to feel responsible for them.

      Taliyah moves away to grow into herself without the knowledge of what she can do pressing against her from all sides, wanting nothing more than to be able to be herself outside of what she can do.   
  
(They want her to stay and build/destroy at their whims, and though the former would be nice, the latter doesn't suit her tastes at all. They offer her praise and adulation, but all she's ever wanted was  **acceptance** , not  **idolatry**.) 

      Ekko moves away to be allowed to be as reckless as he wants around people who he doesn't know, so he doesn't have to worry about them caring. As it turns out, he's not quite as suited for solitude as he thought.  
  
(He'd wanted independence, not loneliness, but then again, gods have always wound up alone no matter how many mortals they tried to keep at their sides, haven't they?)  
  
      He spots the brunette in the park subtly skipping rocks across the water with taps from the toes of her booted feet, and wonders how he should introduce himself to her.   
  
      She watches him help catch a little girl's dog from across the pond (thirteen times) and knows the sudden imbalance despite her firm stance has nothing at all to do with her power. 

 

 

* * *

 

  
"Did the earth just move?"

      Starting, Taliyah feels the glass in her hands drop, and the boy across from her frowns, as if exhasperated, already moving to stop it from shattering. He grabs it by the edges of its rim, lifting and examining it, and then locks his eyes on her once again.

"You know, I don't get you," he begins, as if he knows her, as if he's expecting something. "No matter how many times I do this, no matter how carefully I time it, you always, always drop it."

"Excuse me?" She asks, incredulous and insulted, her eyes flashing fear and anger both, and this time, Ekko reaches out when he rewinds, and brings her with him.  
  
      Later, he'll rewind again and do it all properly-- from dropped glass to real introductions and all-- but for now, he enjoys the startled look on her face when she finds herself outside the museum's gift shop, the glass door staring her right in the face as someone shoulders past her in order to beat someone else inside. He watches her sputter, disbelieving, only to nearly crack his head on the floor when she shoves a piece of the marble out from under him, expression indignant. When he finally gets it right, he realizes that he hadn't had to go through the trouble and feels kind of like an idiot.   
  
      He also feels like it was absolutely worth it, however, so he calls it even and asks for her number. 

 

 

* * *

 

      Taliyah stamps her foot, bringing the ground up, cresting like a wave, and Ekko weaves to one side, then fast-forwards, quick and brief, to press a kiss to her cheek. Disapproving, her eyes follow him as he rewinds-- everything but them, erasing her little fit of pique from the minds of those around them, and brings the flowers that had been in his hand up once again, looking hopeful.

      Rolling her eyes, she beckons him forward, wondering how someone with time at his fingertips can still manage to be late for a date.  **Regularly**.   
  
      He presents the flowers with a flourish, and she tucks one into her hair before cradling the rest, careful, careful, always careful, in one hand and sets the other on her hip, awaiting explanation. When none comes, she prompts it, mouth pinching in displeasure as she chides:   
  
"What took so long? I know I reminded you this morning."  
  
"Well," he begins, one hand on her shoulder and he other turning her to lead her around the side of her building and toward a faint glow coming from the treeline behind it, and she straightens in surprise as he leads them through the trees until they reach a small clearing, lanterns and a picnic blanket set up, basket closed, ice bucket and champagne bottle glimmering faintly under the candlelight. "It... took a few tries to make sure nothing would catch fire."   
  
      Taliyah punches him in the shoulder and, after carefully setting the flowers on the blanket, presses her mouth to his, laughing.   
  
  
(One of the lanterns does end up scorching the blanket, in the end, but she convinces him to leave it. The memory will be a nice one to have.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm officially dubbing this ship Sundial.


	3. Transgression I

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** person, place, thing-- a weary, jaded songwriter; a rose garden; a deck of tarot cards.
> 
>  
> 
> The place had always been long abandoned, empty; he couldn't have known it had owners if they never seemed to be there.

   
   
   
        Mid-afternoon on a Saturday he bids his band goodbye and makes his way out of their practice an hour earlier than he usually would, citing important errands that need doing. Not exactly a lie, but not the whole truth, either, but it's as much as they'll get, and they let him go with minimal fuss. He knows the rest of them are waiting on the next set of songs for their demo, but he can hardly come out and tell them _now_  that he's had writer's block for exactly three weeks as of that morning; Vi alone would smack him one for not piping up or doing something about it sooner, never mind the others. Now he's headed toward a last-ditch effort; the one place that's never failed to provide inspiration when he needs it most. He catches the bus headed toward his place, gets off at the right stop just in case. A quick stop-in at the bodega two corners down from his building lands him sustenance-- ground beef _pastelitos_  and _quipes_ along with a couple of cold _maltas_ , a handful of _suspiritos_ in a wax-coated bag to sate his sweet tooth in between. Then it's three blocks south and two east, and a half hour ride on an entirely different bus out to the edge of the city, and another fifteen minute walk past manicured lawns and neat little carbon-copy houses toward where some of the town's older, larger houses still remain.  
  
        At around three, he hits where houses also begin to give way to forest and cuts a sharp right into the trees, glad he'd chosen to wear boots and not his sneakers today; explaining the wet, dark soil clinging to his soles and caking slightly along the sides would have been much harder with his crisp, white Nikes.  
  
        The crumbling bricks of an old driveway marker greet him not long after, and not far behind it is the mossy, high wall denoting the estate he's headed toward. The gate is closed, lock tight as ever, but he barely pays the main gate any attention. Instead he veers to the left, a gap in the wall knocked open by nature or accident just big enough for him to squeeze through after removing his guitar and pushing it in ahead of himself. The plastic bag in his hand containing his snacks crinkles in a way that's near-deafening this far out in the silence of isolation, but he pays it no mind-- after all, who besides him is around to hear? Old leaves crunch beneath his feet as he hikes his instrument case back onto his shoulder, barely paying attention to the house itself, focusing instead on the wild, overgrown stretch of green that makes up the backyard. Flowers bloom in abundance even now, roses the most prevalent, lining the inside and outside of the tunnel leading from the short set of steps into the wilderness that's become of the garden.   
  
          At its center, an old fountain stands dry, though the pool beneath it is clear for the most part, save for a few errant leaves and petals dotting the glassy, dark surface. Sunlight breaks through the arching canopy of greenery, filtering down in long, aureate ribbons as he sets his bag down on one of the small stone benches that frame it, catching a line of cards along the edge of the fountain as he straightens. To the side, an unlit white candle is visible through the opening in the side of an intricate earthenware lantern, and curious, he draws close-- had someone left these here, since the last time he'd come around? Fingers stretching toward the cards, their pale, surfaces marred only by thin lines and splashes of almost surreal watercolor, his fingers land on the page of cups the instant a soft voice pipes up behind him, startled and defensive--   
  
 "Can I _help_ you?"   
  
        Undignified, a yelp escapes his lips as he jumps and turns, guilty (of what, he doesn't know) expression on his face quickly becoming a wince as gravity takes hold of his guitar case, bringing its neck down against the back of his head as it recovers from his jump. A tapping foot catches his attention, and his gaze is drawn up over tawny boots and slouchy socks bunched around skinny, slightly reddened knees, a sliver of tan thigh, then soft-looking fabric the color of mocha foam over a thin, cream-colored shirt and a thin, loose cardigan dangling from skinny shoulders and bunching around her elbows. Her throat clears, and his head jerks the rest of the way up to see severe brows drawn low over wide eyes set into a gentle-looking oval face that is still, somehow, giving him a glare that could rival Cait's.   
  
"What are you doing," she begins, and he can see, past her crossed arms, that a slender finger is hovering over the call button on her phone, "on my family's property?"  
  
"Okay, no, whoa, whoa, whoa-- no cops, okay? It's just... I thought... I'm not trying to-- this place isn't empty?"   
  
"Not anymore," he gets in response, though her wariness doesn't settle, even as she tries to skirt around him toward the cards and candle he can only assume are hers. "Is it a habit of yours, to break in here?"   
  
        Blunt and almost accusing, and if he could have, he might have gone scarlet at the insinuation; instead he holds up both hands, surrendering, placating, and shakes his head.   
  
"it's... a long story, okay? Look, I'm sorry, I didn't know... This place's been empty since I was a  _kid_ , alright? I don't even live around here anymore, not really, but it's never been... I mean it's always..."   
  
"Always been here, when you needed it?"  
  
"...yeah," Ekko agrees, watching her warily as her irritation changes into something both curious and understanding all at once, and she rushes past him, phone shoved into her pocket, to set her fingers on the cards she'd had laid out. "Am I... missing something?"   
  
        Turning back to him from where she's poring over the cards-- ace of wands, queen of pentacles, and of course the aforementioned page of cups along with a couple more he can't quite make out as she shuffles them together carefully-- she looks between him and the cards, then at the bag he'd set down, eyes narrowing curiously.   
  
"I'll tell you," she bargains, corners of her mouth lifting in what's almost a challenge, "if you share what's in the bag."   
  
         Considering he's technically trespassing, Ekko figures sharing a  _quipe_ or two is the least it'll cost him to not go to jail.   
  
         Her name, he discovers, is Taliyah. The house, which had been contested between her parents and some greedy former acquaintance of the relative who'd owned it for decades, was theirs after a lucky break had landed them with the means to disprove the other's claim on the land. However, her parents traveled a lot, which left Taliyah (and the pet goat that wandered in not long after they'd settled down to talk) to oversee the moving of all their property into the house as well as the repairs that needed doing. He learned she liked to knit and make pottery, and that though she wasn't the best at it, having grown up in the desert, gardening was beginning to grow on her. The Tarot, he also learned, had been a gift from her Grandmother when she was very young; most of the time, she only did it when she had something on her mind.   
  
        The last is admitted sheepishly over the rim of the glass she'd gotten in order to share one of the now-warm _maltas_ with him, ice making a soft chime against glass as she swirled the drink in her hand, looking down into it.   
  
"So... what is it then?"  
  
"H-huh?"  
  
"You said you only do it when there's something on your mind so... what's up?"  
  
        If it's too nosy, he can't bring himself to care; as it stands, he still feels like he's on thin ice despite Taliyah's friendly demeanor now that she doesn't seem to consider him a threat, so thinning it a little more can't really hurt. To his surprise, Taliyah looks aside sharply, the sharp relief of freckles on her cheeks made more apparent by the flush suffusing the skin with a sudden and almost violent immediacy.  
  
"It's... it's nothing, don't worry about it. I kind of... worked it out!" Her tone, bright and reassuring, doesn't do much to convince him, but he leaves well enough alone, leaning back against the bench and taking a long swig of his own drink.  
  
"Whatever you say," he acquiesces, fingers tapping a beat against the case now set at his side, and he realizes, suddenly, that he's been humming for quite a while now. Straightening urgently, he pats himself down for his notebook with one hand and begins to unlatch his guitar case with the other, smiling sheepishly at her curious look. "Sorry, just-- inspiration struck. You don't mind, do you? I know I'm still kind of not supposed to be here, but..."   
  
"Tell you what," she offers, haggling tone in her voice once again, "you're welcome to come and write, so long as you call first. But," here, she holds up a finger, a pout pursing her lips into a soft expression that _sticks_ somewhere high in his rib cage. "Keep it to reasonable hours, okay? I've got school starting soon, after all."  
  
        Ekko sets down his notebook, slings his guitar across his lap, and then sticks a hand out over it to take hers, giving it a firm up-and-down once.  
  
"Done deal," he agrees, and Taliyah's answering smile makes his fingers go straight to his notebook to scribble down the rough beginnings of a first chord. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Caribbean-born city boy Ekko & mori girl-esque Taliyah are self-indulgent as hell but do I care? Nope.


End file.
